Deadline looms for Congress to pass farm bill, essential to Georgia farmers

As a bill to set national food, farm and nutritional assistance policies hangs in the political limbo of a divided Congress, two of Macon’s representatives are working across the aisle to pass a temporary resolution as the deadline for benefits looms on the horizon.

The farm bill, typically passed every five years, earmarks money that creates a safety net for farmers, who have grappled with soaring costs of production for more than two years. The bill also sets funding for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), forestry, extension services, trade and more.

“It’s an urgent situation,” U.S. Rep. Sanford Bishop, D-Columbus, told The Melody. “The farm bill is essential for lenders who bank (with) farmers who want to plant their crops. It’s essential for them to know what the sources of the safety net will be so that they know their loans can be repaid, that farmers will have the resources to make good on their loans. 

“And of course the farmers need to know because they need to make their plans for what they’re going to plant and how much they’re going to buy and how much land they will rent.”

The 2018 Farm Bill expired in September 2023 but was extended for another year. That extension expired more than two months ago, leaving farmers, producers, suppliers and others in the agriculture sector with uncertainty about the future. 

Rep. Austin Scott, R-Tifton, said the situation for farmers is especially acute “because it’s been so long since the last farm bill passed, the reference prices, which are the prices at which support for the American farmer kicks in, are well below today’s cost of production.” 

“Without America’s farmers, the cost of food is going to go through the roof,” Scott said. “There has to be support for American production, agriculture. We don’t want to be dependent on foreign sources of food any more than we want to be dependent on foreign sources of oil.”

Agriculture is Georgia’s oldest industry and continues to be a foundational part of the state’s economy. Georgia’s agricultural producers contributed more than $83.6 billion and 323,300 jobs during 2022, according to the Georgia Farm Bureau. That year, the state tallied 42,400 farms and more than 9.9 million acres of production. 

Georgia also is perennially the No. 1 producer of peanuts, broiler chickens, pecans, blueberries and spring onions, according to the bureau. 

“We’re No. 1 in Georgia for overall agricultural production,” Bishop said of the district he has represented since 1993. “We have about 20% of the state’s agricultural sales in our district.”

Though Scott and Bishop are on the same page about the importance of the bill to Georgia’s economy, the pair of representatives seem to be among few in Congress who are willing to compromise. 

“We’re in a situation we’re probably 15% of Republicans won’t vote for the farm bill because they don’t support American agriculture and about 85% of the Democrats won’t vote for the farm bill,” Scott said, adding it has been “very difficult” to pass legislation this past session. 

“I’ve never seen where the Democrats on the committee — or the majority of the Democrats on the committee — simply refused to negotiate or operate in good faith on the passage of the bill and unfortunately that’s what happened this past year,” Scott said, adding Bishop, who is on the committee, was not part of the majority. 

Neither Scott nor Bishop expect it to pass by the Dec. 20 deadline, but both say they are pushing for the adoption of a continuing resolution to extend benefits for another year while Congress works to reach a compromise on a 2025 farm bill. 

“Bipartisanship is going to be absolutely vital in getting the farm bill passed and signed into law,” Bishop said. “If we don’t pass the farm bill extension next week, then we revert to what’s known as permanent law, which is the 1948 and 1949 farm bills, which really are not applicable and are not sufficient to cover the needs of a 21st century economy for agriculture.” 

Hurricanes that hit Southwest Georgia this year have made the need for disaster relief even more pressing. Bishop said he hopes to include a provision in the continuing resolution to provide relief.

“If they don’t get it in the next three or so months, many of them won’t be able to plant the next crop season,” Bishop said of farmers in his district. “They won’t be able to get financing to have their crops grown and many of them will just go out of business and sell their land in order to pay their debts from the last year.”

In the meantime, Bishop says Georgians should pay attention to what’s happening with the bill “because it is vitally important to everybody in our area and everybody in the country who eats.”